Gouache and Watercolor Flowers
Old Masters Approach to Painting Light
Description
Watercolor is the perfect medium for painting the fragile beauty of flowers, but it can be hard to control while preserving white and light areas of your flower and defining edges on a darker background. If you find painting complex floral forms with watercolor challenging and are looking for alternatives to negative painting or masking, in this class we will learn old masters' approach to painting with watercolor. We will talk about the method of incorporating body color into our paintings, i.e. combining watercolors with Artist’s gouache, as did such world renowned painters as John S. Sargent, Winslow Homer and J.M.W. Turner. We will discuss the differences and similarities between the mediums of gouache and watercolor, as well as technical aspects of painting with both, such as application methods, controlling water content etc. Video demonstrations in this class will illustrate the process of working on various floral compositions. After this class students will have at least three completed paintings and an in-depth understanding of this old masters’ approach to painting white or light objects on darker backgrounds with watercolor. The class will require just very basic knowledge of watercolor and demonstrations are using the supplies that even a beginner watercolorist would already have: paint, paper, brushes, with an addition of a single tube of gouache.
What You Will Learn!
- In this class we will learn an easier way to paint with watercolor, by combining it with white gouache, the way old masters of painting did it.
- The exercises and paintings in the course will take about 5 weeks to complete.
- This class is meant for painters with some basic experience in watercolor who struggle with showing white when painting light on dark.
- The technique shown has been known for centuries, but this class demonstrates a modern approach to painting flowers.
Who Should Attend!
- This class is for watercolor painters who love flowers but are looking for alternatives to techniques like masking or negative painting.
- More experienced artists might find inspiration in this class as well.